- Reduced household exposure to particulate matter and carbon
monoxide
- Uses 60% to 70% less wood than a 3 stone fire
- Decreases time and money spent on finding or purchasing wood
- Produces charcoal at an efficient conversion rate
- The charcoal produced can be used in charcoal stoves or sold
- Decreases women’s & girls labor collecting wood & risk of
being a GBV victim
- Tested and adapted to the cooking needs of
rural households in DRC
- Long lasting stove, 7+years with daily use
Sala Makala's Impact on Health
The driving reason for developing the Sala Makala stove was to
have an impact on the health of the Congolese people. There have
been significant gains in decreasing the incidence of malaria,
diarrheal disease, and other communicable diseases in DR Congo,
but little has been done to prevent acute respiratory infections
(ARI). When it has been addressed, it has often been with clean
cookstove technology that is not efficient enough to have a
statistically significant impact on reducing ARI.
The majority of the rural population in DR Congo
is exposed to harmful levels of PM2.5 almost every
day as 97% of the rural population cooks with wood using a three
stone fire. And, many households cook on three-stone fires
inside their homes.
A traditional three-stone cooking stove
Using national statistics, there are 72,050
deaths in Congo each year due to lower respiratory infection (ARI)
and at least
10,512,899 incidences of ARI illness . That makes deaths
from ARI three and a half times higher than the maternal
mortality. It has been known for a longtime that the primary
cause of ARI is exposure to air pollution that contains
particulate matter less than 2.5 microns (PM2.5).
There is growing literature quantifying
the impact of PM2.5 on causing ARI. 19% of deaths
of children under five are caused by acute respiratory illnesses
(ARI). Nearly 50% of pneumonia deaths in children under 5 are
due to airborne particles inhaled due to indoor air pollution.
The gasifier stove is extremely efficient at
reducing exposure to PM2.5. A tier 4 stove emits 24
times less PM2.5 than a three stone fire.
This makes a three-fold reduction in risk for childhood
pneumonia. A study of a similar gasifier stove in Kenya
showed a 90% reduction in exposure to PM2.5 when
compared to a three-stone fire like what is typically used in
Congo. A Swiss Tropical & Public Health Institute longitudinal
cohort study of users of the Sala Makala stove in Tshikaji
Health Zone of DRC found a statistically significant decrease in
ARI among users of the stove when compared to families using a
three-stone fire for cooking. If a large number of rural
families were to use the Sala Makala stove, it would mean
thousands of lives saved every year.
Impact on the Environment
A gasifier stove, like Durable Solution’s
Sala Makala stove, burns cleanly via the combustion of
gases emitted by heated wood. When done, the charcoal created in
the cooking process can be used in a charcoal burning stoves.
Alternatively, the charcoal may be sold or used as a soil
amendment called ‘biochar’ which improves retention of soil
nutrients. Up to 80 percent of the energy in firewood is lost
during conversion to charcoal depending on kiln efficiency.
Traditional earth pit kilns are estimated to be only 8 – 12%
efficient.
Widespread adoption of Durable Solutions Sala Makala stove by DR Congo’s population that cooks with wood would
result in significant reduction in deforestation and the release
of greenhouse gasses. Normal household cooking with the Sala
Makala stove would produce 600 to 800 grams of charcoal a day
from 3 to 4 kg of firewood. This translates to an average of one
metric ton of charcoal produced per day for every 1,400 stoves
in use.
Fabrication of
Sala Makala stoves in Goma, DRC
This would combat deforestation by displacing
up to 12 metric tons of firewood that would otherwise be
inefficiently converted to charcoal by traditional earth pits.
The reduction in deforestation and charcoal production similarly
reduces loss of biodiversity, decreases soil erosion, and
promotes water infiltration supplying springs.
Impact on labor, particularly of women.
Globally, women and children can spend up to 5
hours a day collecting firewood or expend significant financial
resources to buy firewood or charcoal. IMA’s stove efficiently
produces cooking heat from wood resulting in a charcoal
byproduct. This efficiency translates into reduced amounts of
wood needed to be collected and thus less time collecting wood.
Because the stove burns wood in ‘batches’, once lit, the fire
need not be tended as compared to a three-stone fire or a rocket
stove, freeing the cook (usually women) to carry out other
activities.
Impact on livelihood incomes
In Congo, low-income urban and peri-urban
families spend about 33% of their income on buying charcoal to
cook their food. Because the Sala Makala stove produces charcoal
as a by-product of cooking, peri-urban families that have access
to wood can decrease their monthly fuel budget by burning wood
and producing charcoal for sale or use the charcoal to cook with
and offset fuel purchases. Rural families cook almost
exclusively with wood and the charcoal produced by the stove is
a new potential source of revenue for rural families as they can
sell it to peri-urban and urban areas.
